Diets? Not another One

Nooo I hear you scream as you reach for the exit button.  Who needs to hear about a new diet?  Just kidding.  I don't want to talk about a food diet today, I want to talk about what we feed our minds.  Don't get me wrong; what we eat is important and of course we should do the best we can for our beautiful bodies that serve us so faithfully each and every day.
But what do we feed our minds?  Do we really know?


We're constantly being bombarded by information from the media, from friends and family, from our teachers etc etc the list goes on.  The good thing is we can retreat from this external bombardment whenever we choose to.

Or can we?  What happens when we find ourselves alone, hoping to regenerate, relax and revive?  What actually goes through our minds when we're quiet enough to listen?
That's the crux of today's little chat.  This is the diet I'm talking about - what we feed our minds when all outside inputs have lessened.

I believe we can choose the thoughts we think.  Right now.
We can stop.  We can choose.

This is crucial to understand because -  "What we think, we become."  Buddha

The big 'but' (no pun intended given we're talking about diet - lol) is that in order to choose we need to be aware.  When we're aware of what we're thinking we can actually stop a thought in mid-sentence and say "Hang on, no.  I choose to stop you, negative thought.  I now replace you with a better, kinder, gentler one."

To paraphrase Eckhart Tolle, we need to be the observer.  We need to be able to take a step back from ourselves and take a good look.  We need to be able to say "Ah, so that's what I've been telling myself all these years!  'Bout time I did something about that then!"

This may take practice, but the practice is worth it.  Be persistent.  Begin today.  As Buddha said,

"There are only two mistakes we can make along the road to truth:  not going all the way, and not starting."

Let's start!  :o)